


Back Burner

by snaeken



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: Angst, Chris's POV, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 11:31:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10785906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snaeken/pseuds/snaeken
Summary: “Isak?” Chris asks.“I…” Isak pauses, swallows. Chris watches his Adam’s apple bob up, then down.“Say it back, Isak,” Chris pleads, tears forming in his own eyes. “Say you love me.”***Or: Chris was always good at running away.





	Back Burner

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this is my first Skam fic. Let me know what you think and come say hi on [tumblr](http://everchanger.tumblr.com)!

The couple walking past the diner were young and clearly infatuated with each other. They were in a group of half a dozen or so, yet obviously away in their own world. The slightly smaller guy was tucked into the bigger one’s side, both laughing at something one of them had said. It didn’t matter that there was a chill in the air; that the snow was slowly starting to settle on their jackets rather than melt upon impact. In that moment they could have been anywhere, and as long as they had each other it wouldn’t have mattered. In each other, they looked like they had everything they needed.

 

Chris wondered when he and Isak stopped looking like that.

 

Chris watched from inside the diner as the couple walked past the window and out of sight. They had only been in his line of sight for a few seconds, but that’s all Chris needed.

The diner had become his new favourite escape a few weeks ago. He had stormed out of the apartment after his latest argument with Isak, walked the streets for a bit to try and clear his head. The diner had looked welcoming enough from outside, so in he had gone. Now he had been there often enough that the waitress knew his order by heart, simply brought it over and placed it on the table with a sad smile. She had asked more than once if he was okay. He had simply shaken his head, then shaken it again when she asked if he wanted to talk about it.

He picked up his coffee and took a sip, grimacing at the taste of the now-cold liquid. He had been there for too long. He should go home.

 

A girl walked past the diner’s window, young and definitely not dressed for the weather. She had the same vacant look in her eyes that Chris realised he must have a lot of the time. Just as quickly as she had appeared, the girl was gone. He vaguely thought about going to check if she was okay, but what good would he be to someone else when he couldn’t even help himself?

 

People watching had become Chris’s new favourite hobby. He could pretend they were anyone or anything, and it didn’t matter because he would never know who they really were anyway. It passed the time and gave him something else to think about, an undeserved reprieve from everything important in his life. For a little while he could forget about the bills with the aggressive red ‘FINAL DEMAND’ stamps on the front, or the clogged toilet he and Isak could neither fix nor pay someone else to sort, or that he and Isak could no longer even have a civilised conversation without it descending into a petty argument about subjects neither of them really cared about.

 

Brought out of his thoughts by the waitress telling him they would be closing up in five minutes, Chris sighed and left the diner. He knows he can’t run away from his problems forever, but it always feels like a punch to the gut when he actually has to face them.

 

Hands shaking slightly from the cold, Chris fumbles with his key for a moment before getting it in the slot. Quietly opening the door and going inside, he was relieved to see there weren’t any lights on. That meant Isak had gone to bed, and he could avoid another argument for a little while.

 

After brushing his teeth Chris strips off, leaving just his underwear on. He’s about to get into bed when Isak says, “Good night?” His words are clipped, not really a question. He may be in bed but he clearly wasn’t asleep.

 

“It was fine.” Chris gets into bed, feels like he should add a bit more when Isak doesn’t ask. “Went for a coffee, lost track of time a bit.”

 

Isak still doesn’t say anything, and Chris starts to think he actually has gone to sleep this time. Isak is lying on his back so Chris is unable to spoon him. It hurts him, but Chris is also glad. Isak has shrugged him off when he’s come home late before, and that hurt a whole lot more than not having the option at all. After a minute or so Isak sits up and flicks the switch on the bedside lamp. Chris has to squint against the light for a moment, then immediately wishes it was switched off again when he sees the look on Isak’s face. When they’ve been around each other recently they’ve both been irritated, or angry, or both. But now Isak looks upset. His eyes are rimmed red, still slightly moist from where he’s obviously been crying.

 

Isak takes a shuddering breath before speaking. “When are you going to realise you can’t just keep running away from everything, Chris?”

 

Chris can’t deal with Isak looking like that and sounding like that; not when he knows he’s the cause of it..

 

“Please don’t be upset,” Chris tries to hug Isak, but Isak deflects him. “I’m sorry I’ve not been here much recently. I love you.”

 

Isak averts his eyes, doesn’t reply. Chris feels sick. They always say it back to each other. Even if it’s half-hearted, even if they’re only really saying it for the sake of saying it; they always say it back.

Chris wishes he could go back to the diner and invent lives for more of the passers-by. He wishes he could invent an alternate life for himself. One in which the past few months never happened. One in which this current conversation wasn’t happening. Any life had to be better than what was happening right here, right now.

 

“Isak?” Chris asks.

 

“I…” Isak pauses, swallows. Chris watches his Adam’s apple bob up, then down.

 

“Say it back, Isak,” Chris pleads, tears forming in his own eyes. “Say you love me.”

 

Isak turns to face him. Tears are falling down his cheeks, but he doesn’t wipe them away. “This isn’t working anymore, Chris.” His voice is small, soft. “ _ _We__  aren’t working.”

 

“No, no, don’t say that. I can be better, I __will__  be better, I-”

 

“Stop, Chris,” Isak tells him. He brushes a thumb across Chris’s cheek, wiping away the tear falling down it. “You won’t. You know you won’t.”

 

Chris wishes he and Isak were the couple he saw earlier at the diner. They had looked so genuinely happy to be with each other.

 

“Please, Isak. Please not now, please…” Chris can barely speak through the tightness in his throat and his hitching breaths. He hates himself for saying it, knows it’s exactly what Isak was just chastising him for. Even now he’s trying to put off the problem, hopes that if he ignores it then it will go away.

 

“Okay,” Isak sighs, relents. “Tomorrow.” He opens his arms and Chris gratefully accepts, burying his head against Isak’s chest. Isak reaches over to switch off the lamp, then starts carding his fingers through Chris’s hair. Isak holds him like that until Chris’s body stops shaking, until his breathing evens out.

 

Like the bills and the broken toilet, their impending breakup is just another addition to Chris’s back burner. Everything is looming over his head with an impossible weight, bearing down on him more and more with every passing moment.

 

Still, for now he’s asleep. Probably for the last time, he and Isak are sharing a bed, taking the limited comfort they can still get from each others arms.

 

He can deal with it all tomorrow.


End file.
